A Meeting in Wraithmarsh
by Missbexiee
Summary: We all know this man... the one who unleashed the Shadows onto Oakvale. But how does he feel constantly having to repeat the dulls of living day in day out? After a regular sacrifice to the Shadows, Reaver takes a few moments on his journey home to reevaluate his life and on the way comes to pass with his old lover, thought lost among the screams of Oakvale's demise. One shot.


**A short one shot observing the man that is Reaver.**

**I LOVE this man (super smexy and funny) and find him one of the best characters (if not _the_ best in the Fable universe).**

******Note: I thought it would be really cool to look at Reaver from a far, have access to his mind and put him in a common setting for him, I also wanted to explore his backstory a bit and _her _voice from the Diary Pages. I have played EVERY Fable game multiple times and love each game like my baby (yes even Fable 3). I love playing around in open world settings, having a wife/husband in every location (I've gotten to 8 families before and 32 children, don't know if that's a glitch or not, lol). Anyways I hope you enjoy this.******

Disclaimer: I do not own Reaver (which is too bad) ;) or Lionhead or the Fable franchise (another too bad, this girl has ideas!)

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The King of Thieves

Mud sticks to his boots as he lets out of the carriage, either it had rained previous or the dank air had kept the ground moist. It is only on this recurring trip that he pays the coachman extra. This is either done to keep him quiet, or for once in the man's cold life to stick his neck out for another. The young boy seems delighted to take in the extra gold. He recognizes the famous man of course, one of the only nobles in all of Bloodstone to pay visit.

No words are exchanged as the towering man steps out for his trek. This cursed trek he must repeat year after year. He turns slowly, holding his clean hand towards a dirty one. The young blond steps out timidly. Her rosy cheeks are unwelcome in the depressing marshes. Souls would thirst for life like hers, kill for life like hers. And yet still, such a pure face lays covered under several year's worth of grime.

None of this is her fault. Bloodstone is a dirty port.

Her body moves slowly, still drunk with sex and alcohol... _and_ being with the most handsome man she's ever laid eyes on. That man only watches as her chest itches its way out of her top, the blackened welts on her body not given by him but the hundreds of other men who have used her.

"Come now," he tries to keep the harshness of his voice hidden lest she back out now.

The setting frightens the girl, "Wraithmarsh...? But sir-"

The man looks behind him, hearing a crack but finding no culprit. He turns back, a paranoid vigor held in his eyes, "Hurry now," he feels his inside coat pocket, knocking over a watch, a journal more used for diary-like purposes of guilt, and a gun. However, he feels it as it pricks his finger through the luxurious gloves. The seal.

How many years has he done this for now? A hundred? Two hundred? A man loses track. And yet every year the fear of failure, the fear of death haunts him so. The carriage begins to clop away, even a dumb creature like a horse can sense the pain in this deserted forest of death. There will be no return. It will be a long walk back home, a silent one.

His arm slips into the girls, while the other rests jumpily on his favorite pistol. He killed all the previous owners to have it, though he did leave one to an old friend. The very word _friend_ lays harshly on his tongue. Could he really have any of _those_ in his lifetime?

"Where... where are we going?" The girl more like that of a child attempts to soak in the disgust and reject surrounding her. Hours ago she was warm, in a bed coupled with people. She had held _him_ in her arms. She had finally been able to go to one of _his_ parties. The greatest parties in all of Albion.

"Sh, hold your tongue," with no more carriage or escape he could reveal his true tone. He grips her tighter as the marsh increases... this is banshee territory. Gravestones litter the old part of Oakvale... the part nearly destroyed many years before his birth by the foretold bandits.

The trees weep into the marsh as a thin fog covers the muddled path, hidden away from human eyes for quite some time. It's a path traveled only by the drunk, the brave, and the cursed.

_He_ was one such man.

Chills run up his spine as spirits wisp by the familiar and his unfamiliar. They taunt him at a decibel only he can make out. Their screeching cries harsher than most banshees can muster, for these souls know him. These souls were trapped here by him. Banshees are merely creatures guided by the wisps.

"_Look who's come to visit_," a light blue one whispers. Their colors reveal their history. Light blue generally very young, dark blue their opposite. White ones killed as virgins. Red ones driven by lust in their short lives.

A harsh chuckle shakes through the bones of the man forcing himself upright while silenced in bereavement, "_He looks so old... he must be thirsty for more_."

The words cut nonexistent wrinkles into the handsome man's face. His hand lets go of the blond, as it carefully feels for the pools under his eyes, he checks down for liver spots on his fingers. Death would not take him, even if he must sacrifice the whole world.

"_Poor baby, my little boy was always a sick one_," the whisper is unmistakeable, his own mother's welcome tongue. He was not the death of her, but her soul had cried upon learning the pain her youngest had caused. His stature is large, its as if he grows year after year, but even his mother's words force him to stoop lower – to the height of his childhood years almost, a time wrapped in hand-me-down blankets and a pitiful fire warming his ailing body.

He shakes these terrible voices, these mumblings of guilt he must live with throughout all his years. The gloved hand grabs the dirty arm of the girl as he attempts to shut out the curses flied upon him by old friends, old family... old enemies.

"Why so fast?" The girl's voice trembles, as the heaviness of death surrounding her attempts to eat at her heart, "Why is this place so sad?"

A thick fog rolls in, blinding the duo. The man has already bared his weapon against it. Paled by fear, the girl cowers into a statue like pose underneath the man who escorts her. The spirits summon her, they summon a banshee to taunt the man.

"_Join us_," the chant together as they swirl around the dead mother stripped of her children, "_Join usss_!"

The banshee appears and screams her hooded call to the orphaned spirits lost with time. Small black babies and toddlers gather at their mother's beckon. They hold know memory or place in the man's eyes. Their eyes yellow as if being of such a color is due to crying late at night for parents to return.

"_Alexander_..." The banshee spews a name into the empty hallow void of the living.

"Who... who's Alexander?" The young girl clenches to the man's long, ornate overcoat. Her questions hold no pertinence to him. She will never understand, and she has no need to.

The man flips the gun as he shoots the dusty children one by one. Their screams pierce the air as he pushes them back to their resting places. A tornado swirls with anger as the mother is removed of her children once more in her depressing existence.

"_You, Alexander... You killed them all, your friends, your lover... your child_," The words are cried like an old shrew wailing for her time lost to return. So much pain is wound in the ragged creature's voice.

The man turns a slight bit after shooting the banshee into silence, "I do not know who she speaks of," he claims this to the young girl, though it bears no matter of importance to her. She wishes only to be back home, back home where she is nothing but trash to the pirates who bunk up in the local inn. Where she is no one to anyone. Yes, even this fate she lives is better than being here with this man who promises of a better life.

"_Alex, she yearns for you... Phillipa misses her husband..._"

Her name. She said _her_ name! The man clutches at his hair, longing to rip it out. How dare this beast unravel such locked away memories. _How dare she say _her_ name_.

"Silence!" He shouts the word as the bullets fly from his gun faster than any person alive... or dead for that matter. His mastery of skill blinds through the creature in the form of a quick death. The banshee cries as her disembodied cloak fades and falls to the lowering fog. The man, satisfied, but also tired turns to the girl, "Up, we travel further."

The girl shakes, having encountered something so terrible and vile seen only by a few. And yet only one question plagues her mind as she looks up at the beautiful, almost unreal man before her, "Who... who is Phillipa?"

His eye twitches. He must restrain himself yet every particle in his being cheers to shoot her, but he needs her. He needs to sacrifice this disgusting, useless creature who knows next to nothing of how he feels. Of how he pains day after day for the happier time in his life... his time with _her_.

She isn't shot, nor is her flawless skin beaten. He merely grabs the grimy hand once more and pulls her down the path. She still follows willingly, but the drunken peace of the man has vanquished. The image of the well dressed man, drinks in hand, smile for miles, all gone. He is none of these things, he is troubled, deeply, he is paranoid by nonliving beings. He's confused. And the young girl notes all of these things.

They near a bridge, an old covered one. One never seen by the young girl, but one embedded into memories for the man. How many times had he ran across the old wooded floorboards. Dancing happily about a gold for some sweets in town, smiling widely for a festival nearing its date. Trampling down it for the chance to propose to the girl of his dreams.

Too many memories. The bridge turns to flames as the eyes of the man play tricks on his plagued mind. Flames of the shadows appear that had ran rampant when he accidentally cursed his village. Even through the gloves he can feel the energy embedded into the hardened wood of the bridge. The girl follows slowly now, as if exhausted from the draining trek in the forgotten woodland.

The flames turn to repaired and new wood as his memory shifts to happier times. Flowers burst through small crevices of the covered dock. Birds chirp where none have dared in more recent years. His feet tap loudly, but dignified across the boards... as if only _he_ had permission to walk across them. The small abandoned and hideous house sitting adjacent from the bridge livens with new paint and air. Its as if this fragmentation of his brain allows him to journey forth.

His childhood memories become alive as he notices a small boy hopping through tall fields of wheat. Parents of the boy look on with smiles, uncertain of how long the child will live - his birth alone was a miracle. But the boy smiles on, unaware of such discussions about him until much later in his life where sickness seemed to follow him continually and his nose was never free of the blood touched mucus.

"Um, sir..."

The feeble, weak voice snaps him out of his trance. Suddenly, the house turns into a black, dilapidated, forgotten nest for the dead. His hands shake as he physically forces himself to look away. In a much more hushed breath he now pulls the woman forward and in somewhat of a way she becomes the one dragging him along.

It takes what seems like an eternity to cross the forgotten bridge, but the man succeeds. His eyes must blink over and over again to lock the memories away with the others. How foolish of him to even try to picture them now once more. He deserved no such pleasure from this place.

His eyes shut once more as he nears the old cave staring over the sunken town. A door, carved in old kingdom motifs sits ominously before it all. His hand traces the familiar patterns that they trace yearly as his other pulls out the dark, cold object used for entry.

The seal reaches deep into both the humans' souls. Tears well into the eyes of the girl, still unsure of what is going to pass but knowing it will terrible all together. She is now in the heart of Wraithmarsh... the flooded and cursed village of Oakvale, a tale forgotten and unknown by many. Her body loses much of its warmth as the sad seal is placed on the door.

Her eyes become obsessed with watching the seal magically turn the door open. Its as if her mind is hypnotized by the spinning for so long a moment, she loses who she is. The cave opens and breathes out an icy air towards its two guests.

"_Welcomeeeee..._" A voice, belonging to no one calls out to its visitors and lights the melted, dripping candles with light down the staircase to its treasure.

The man no longer has any need to take care of the woman. His heart is locked once more, for the next year. Only the brief memories and fixation he has on certain buildings and marks in the land guilt him into depression. He has no reason for this now. Now, he is getting his reward for suffering through it all.

Her feet ache and tire from such a journey... how has a man like this managed to stay so full of energy, so quick on his feet? Many who enter here ask the same very question of the man. Though the reasoning changes through the years. No longer is he a loner, or a bandit, nor a pirate. His ties still leak into Bloodstone every now and again, but his name no longer holds the same backing. No, the new mask he now dons is a head of industry, a millionaire, an adviser to the crown. It has taken his life the years of hundreds to reach the reigns of Albion, but never once has he grabbed them.

That is a mask set for another era.

His boots made from the finest leathers support his growing feet in a particular manner. Handmade and expensive to commission they are near exact replicas of the ones he once wore as a boy. Of course now they are more exquisite, their olden style still shines through. Lately his past has come to not only taunt him, but to invite him... and slowly he slips back towards it.

To a world where people recognize him and he isn't forced to change identities to support his secret. To a world where those familiar love him, and aren't spewing his name in scorn. To a world of the past and one long gone for him. He is cursed to a life among the living for his deep driven fear of death, of being sick.

He is an immortal, at the cost of millions, though he hardly ever bats an eye. The stairs open and before him sit the Shadow Court - three ghastly men driven by greed and evil so much that their skin has been traded for ash. A book sits on the ledge before the Shadow's sacrifice pit. His name is scribed there with four others – three dead and one who he does not and must not know. The blood must have stained the pages forever, _his_ blood... he hasn't seen such a thing in a century.

"_Showwww her..._" The left Shadow purrs with hunger as his red eyes grow thirsty for the young blooded woman.

"W-where... what is going on?" Her head turns frantically as she attempts to move her solid legs off the ground but finds them planted in fear. She turns to the man she trusted, the one she slept with and hoped would solve her ailing poverty, "Sir! S-sir, please... h-help me!"

"_This issss the priceee you mussst pay, we will taaaake her soooul sooo that the Kinggg of Thieves may retaaain hisssss..._" The middle shadow almost smiles an invisible smirk as he reveals the price of the man's business. And a thief was the proper word for him, not for mere physical items though he had plenty, but for figurative wishes – for virginity, souls, and pain.

The girl now shakes uncontrollably as tears stream down her beautiful face. Her body swirls with magical wisps sent by the three Shadows. Each one of them takes an asset and a year from the young child. The dirt and grime wipes away but leave wrinkles, crow's feet and useless skin in return. Her life is stripped from her and yet... the man by her smiles as youth flies through his nostrils and soaks into his skin, ripening the flesh and tightening his grin.

Such an experience would make even the purest grin with happiness. Not out of seeing a youthful woman shriek in pain, but out of simple lust for life being granted back into oneself. An unimaginable feeling - years being added back onto someone's ticking clock.

The old woman now falls to the ground, weakened by years unknown to her. Her spotted, tired, arms reach for the man who had cursed her like such, "R-r-rea-"

His gun is in his hand before the woman breathes the name. And she is dead by the time she whispers the second syllable. No remorse is shown. His heart has hardened during the journey and like the seal he is sent at this time every year, he is cold.

"_Weee will commme once morrre in a yearrrs timeee, and whennnn the paaayments stop_," the third Shadow gutters the rest of the deal, like a man following protocol, "_so shaaaaall your lifeee in this woooorld_."

The words do little to phase the now restrengthened man. He turns with a flash of his long coat as he aims for the steps out of the tomb, leaving the cold, dead woman in his wake. Shadows of hobbes, balverines, and hallow men rush past him and feast upon his leftover treat. The stairs are light on his feet as he climbs them towards the equally dark exit to Oakvale.

Up above him the sky begins to cry and splatter down on the buried and trapped within the area. It does not phase him; he has business to handle back in Bowerstone, he hates the place, thinking of himself more suited in nature and simple towns.

His body moves him through the swamp and into the old village he once called home. His attempts to ignore the scenery prove to do him well as his memories stay locked within him. But something shakes the ground, something drips into a puddle, something yearns to greet him.

She comes with the fog, not a hissing fog like a banshee, but a drifting one. Her body is still pristine, preserved from years of wear. His eyes mistake him as he watches the figure takes life in front of him. It can't be real. It isn't real.

Never before on a trek through the dying woods has he met _her_ like this. _Never_.

And her voice is real, the angelic singing of her quiet demur overpowers the rain pitting itself in the ground, "_To market, to market to buy a clucking hen_," the song is sung much slower than the typical old tune, "_Home with it! Home with it! Shove it in a pen_," she sways slightly as if dancing to her own song like hum, "_Stuff it till Avosday and make a happy hen_," her eyes continue to shut throughout her whole number as if trying to keep the music going, "_Then at Skorm's Show win a prize, pippity please again_!"

The man is beside himself. This girl who he knows all too well singing as happily as she can in front of him, donning the words they sang once as children. He feels so juvenile as his hoarse voice joins with hers, "_To market, to market to buy an apple bun_," her eyes open and watch him silently finish the last line alone, "_Home again, home again marketing is done_."

"Alex..." Her long eyelashes blink lovingly as her chest begins to heave.

The man shakes his head, "Phillipa, my sweet," his eyes shake as they observe her with the utmost attention. Every strand of hair is just how she left it, her cheeks still perk with the highest of apples, and her smile still continuing to warm any a lost soul, "you look simply ravishing."

"You've come for me," her emotions get the best of her as she clutches her out-dated gown in eager anticipation, "Alex," she yells as beautifully as she can, "Alex, has come to be with me!"

The words frighten the man as his emotions slowly flee him, "But, Phillipa, I am living still."

Her eyebrows crease in confusion, "My love, we have been separated for hundreds of years. No one knows of what truly passed on _that_ night. Do you not wish to be with me?" Her ghostly hand touches the man's face like a mother holding her child. Sadness enters her voice, "Why else would you come here?"

"Phillipa, you know I love you..." he stumbles to find the words, not used to speaking in such ancient words. She hobbles slightly in her dress, a nervous tick of hers. He shakes his head, "I want to be with you so desperately but I can not. I tried _that_ day, Phillipa, the Shadows tricked me!"

Her eyes suddenly narrow, "The Shadows," her voice changes from whisper to yell, "You left me for hundreds of years for the Shadows? All that gossip of you being immortal in such a horrid way is true? I warned you, Alex! I asked you to forget those silly notions!"

The man's demeanor changes now as well. To any outsider in the lonely woods it would appear the man is yelling at nothing but a figment of his imagination, "Phillipa, I told you all those years ago... Death can not take me! I will not allow it," his words bite at the ghost woman, "Death greeted me too many times a child, I can not allow it to take me in once more!"

Her face saddens, "Oh, Alex, death is not an unkind fellow. He held me gently when he brought me here... the world of the dead would invite you," she shakes her head while holding back tears, "everyone, Alex, everyone wants to see you once more. Does your human life not torment you so, with the pain and struggle of living?"

The man's hands tremble, "My love. I am a hero, like those who died with the burning of the guild. I wish not to die, not with this power and status I have gained. It only pains me deeply the Shadows betrayed me and kept me from you."

"They did not betray you," she moves closer to the man, looking deep into his soul and face and observing every detail, "I understand now. As I slept _that_ night they came and looked over Thomas and I," the man looks away at the mention of his child, "they asked me if I wished to be immortal. I was given a choice, and I said _no_."

He shakes with something of a mixture of anger and loneliness, "Phillipa! We could all be living together right now!" He struggles to calm his emotions, these feelings that bring up over two hundred years of loathing, "Why, Phillipa, why would you curse me so!"

She flies back, visibly offended, she opens her mouth several times searching for an accusations to counter his. But she uses none and simply changes her tone, "Alex," she swallows the name painfully, "you're one of those terrible heroes... you burned all of your home and killed..." she refuses to continue lest she break into tears.

His hands now reach to her and he feels her coldness within his, "I didn't mean too. I was so young, so, so stupid. You will never understand the guilt I deal with, the alcohol I must drink to smile. The pain I feel being separated from you," his nose begins to sting, "Phillipa, I only followed a cloaked woman who stood outside our window that night. She brought me to what I most desired to have, what would make my life with you perfect and never ending. In the Shadow's tomb I awoke my skill."

"Alex, you speak of not knowing this pain you feel, when I feel the same dagger drive through my heart ever night I close my baby's eyes alone. You speak of the shadows granting you all you ever wanted when I was led to believe _I_ was all you wanted... You claim it to be an accident, but such greed is not," she breathes deeply, her hair blowing gently as the wind picks up around her and the rain starts to fly through her translucent skin, "Alex, you say it mistake we were not saved that night and therefore are not together now, but we still can be. You can join your friends, your family, your love."

"Phillipa," the man's years of practice with keeping his emotion at bay crumble underneath his wife's words, "It is impossible. I am not a man to submit to fate and never will. I do not think there will ever come a time I join you in the grave, call me coward, but it is so."

Tears break over her eyes and she begins weeping. The trees sway delicately with her as if saddened by her broken heart, "So it is goodbye then. You kept faithful to me all these years and now we say a farewell. You must know of my happiness when I heard you were wandering through the marshes year after year... searching for me."

The man's heart breaks. He is not faithful, he sleeps with countless women and men to feel even the slightest bit of sympathy for his past, to try and rekindle the tiniest bit of joy he had when with her. He was not seeing her those years, he was merely kindling his own greed and lust for youth. The man shakes his head with dejected breaths.

"Phillipa, I am not worthy of you. I wish you the best," he turns to leave her – to head further on his current path towards Bowerstone, "I retract, however, my earlier statement... perhaps one day we will meet once more. Until then I can not overcome my fear of the undead life."

A smile parts the ghost's face as if this statement is enough from him to keep her going for another thousand years, "My love," she swoops over the ground to clasp his face once more, "you will."

Her neck dips down as the man reaches to grab the hallow figure and press his lips against hers. After all these years, to be able to kiss such a woman, his woman. He knows one day it might all end, and their love can be true once more. One day he may commit the act of death upon himself, leaving on his own terms and not out of a sickness. But now is not that time.

The two part and he furthers his journey to the city. Nowadays the marsh of Oakvale is slowly beginning to enter other areas of Albion. He cannot stop this and allows it to pass. His strong feet journey ahead, finding a Culis Gate. The gun in his hand vibrates, defining who he is and the blood that runs through him.

His eyes catch the sad gaze of a mist far off in the distance and he is gone. His body finds itself landed upon Garth's old tower. The old Queen made it into a _library_, a dull idea in the man's opinion and a poor thing for Garth to agree to. Few people know of the Gate atop the castle, the man eyes down at the people observing their pointless lives and day-to-day existence, each one of them accepting death as something natural and normal.

It is here he gathers a coach, one that takes him through the valleys and hills of mountains. The scenery in Albion gets so dull to the man, only what little is left of Oakvale stands out on a map. His head starts to ache and he tells the coach driver to stop. Even with youth and time splurging from his body, he still feels old, so much more mature than this whole world.

He stops to sit at a large lake in the middle of the valley, even nature gives in to times and allows itself to be reshappen. The glove leaves his hand as he removes it to feel the cool water. Snow powders the tops of the mountains around this area, and the water is icy to match. But it feels more alive than he at this moment. Why did she come see him? Why did she mention their son?

Even now, just talking with himself he finds himself unable to find the words. He takes in a deep breath and calls the coach over once more. The mud on his boots disgusts him, reminding him too much... of a different time. As he boards he pays the man extra to polish them for him – still, though, not nearly as much as the lad in Bloodstone. Bless any sod who lives in _that_ dump.

He wonders for a brief moment as the carriage begins passing through Millfields and past his expansive house on the old Bower Lake what his fellow past heroes would say of him. The man never saw much of Hammer, hero of strength, but when they would get together the two would bicker and both end up with a smile on their face, she could keep up with him like few others. Garth, the damn wizard, never liked him and it was a reciprocated feeling. But Queen Sparrow, and she's the only one the man will call Queen or King in this world, was different from all of them. Smart, funny, the two connected. Their was tragedy in her and also a bit of innocence that meant much to the man stripped from it. She was amoral, doing good and bad every now and a gain, and he respected that.

The eyes of the man gaze out toward Bower Lake's gazebo, what used to be the old Guild Hall area. Memories were stripped without his approval, and yet Hero's Hill still stands as high as ever over his house. He is not typically a nostalgic man, but for once in his life fate had brought him three people whom he could connect with. Three heroes not ashamed to be such, different from the time he grew up in.

But fate also brought him together with that spying seer, obsessed with his life and constantly telling him what to do. She probably _never_ told the other Heroes what to do. But something makes him feel he knows her, whenever she visits in a dream... he can sense something off about her. As if they share a similar past.

However this is too much to dwell on, and as the road changes to less expensive brick he knows he's in Bowerstone. The young boy calls back to him, after a while all coach men grow the same face. He looks out his curtained window to watch the milling people, they are quite fascinating. The coach stops.

"Bowerstone Castle, sir, almost there!" The boy says this nervously, not wanting to scare the well renown man.

He turns for a slight moment, about to wave on ahead. But a little boy locks eyes with him. His eyes are brown, not quite like his own but similar. The memories of the past day still haunt the man and ache at his heart, the heart he tries to lock away day after day. The little boy reminds him of his own son... Thomas, the son he never got a chance to love.

The child smiles and waves at the unfamiliar coach as a small puppy yaps up at him and dances around his feet. Wagging its tail the dog barks loudly, and the small yap reminds the man so much of his old friend's dog. This was unlike him, and he blames that cursed woman for unlocking his heart a brief moment.

"Beak here please," he calls out to the driver who abruptly holds the reigns for good. The man exits in the middle of Bowerstone Market, emitting such an appearance as to scare those around him into hushed silence. He walks to the boy with the puppy, "Excuse me lad, where did you get that, eh, creature?"

"There's a sale over at that stall, mama bought it for me!" He smiles a toothy smile, though quite a few are missing.

Even the coldhearted man can't help but find the love between the boy and his friend adorable. He tosses the duo a few gold as he moves to the stall. The entire square is still in stunned silence.

Dogs begin yapping loudly as the man makes his debut. The shopkeeper's eyes light up, this man clearly had money, "What can I do for you sir?"

The man blinks while staring down at the filthy vermin hustling around in the large crate. Black ones, white ones, spotted ones, "I need the best puppy you have," he unleashes his gun and holds it to the man's throat, "and don't you even think about cheating me."

A loud gulp is heard from most everyone in a near proximity of the stall, the shopkeeper offers a polite smile as he pulls out a spotted puppy from the back, "He might not look like much, but this one is a fast runner and very energetic. He also helped me find my keys a day ago!"

Money passes hands as the man purchases the dog with a smile, he had once met a dog who had a good nose. The shopkeeper offers a red bow for it, assuming it a gift and the dog breathes happily as the man grudgingly pets its nose. He orders the coach driver to carry it back for him as he boards the carriage once more for what is a mere ten minute walk from the square.

The gates open for him as he enters the castle, bustling with nobles. Today was a special day. Five years after the late Queen's death, her first born son will now assume throne. But the man will see Logan in a moment. He pushes past the stuffy elite, as they gobble cakes and guzzle fine wines, and exits through the bustling kitchen of the castle.

Out in the courtyard he knows just who he'll see. The little boy plays with a toy sword down by his mother's tomb. He was just a babe when the Queen died... How little he must know of his mother. The man almost startles the young child as he walks near him.

"Oh!" He puts down his sword, "I'm very sorry sir, the gathering is inside!"

"My boy, you look a lot like your mother," the eyes were a dead giveaway.

The small child grows such a quizzical expression, "You know my mother?"

The man nods, "Yes I do," he kneels to the boy's level looking him in those eyes he once journeyed with, "I know today will be all about your brother, but I have a gift for you."

His princely smile lights up, "A present? I love those!"

The elder nods, "Oh, I'm sure..." he opens his coat where the bowed up puppy sits happily in his gun holster, so small and innocent.

A quiet bark is heard from the tiny creature as he runs for the boy who's smile is greater than any the man has ever seen. The dog's black marks over his eyes gleam as he chases the boy and his wooden sword around the yard, the Prince almost forgets to give his thanks, "You're really nice, Sir, thanks a whole bunch!"

And he's off again. The man let's a grin cross his face, not a smug one, but a happy one. He looks up to the old woman's tomb, "He's just like you, Sparrow."

"Reaver?"

For a second the voice responding to him causes him to jump from his skin and grab his pistol. Would he be speaking with another ghost this evening? But he turns and finds it only to be the young King.

"Ah, Logan," the man closes himself up again, he had shown enough emotion and caring for others to last him into the next decade, "Congratulations."

The young King smiles slightly, "Um, I'm currently meeting with Sir Walter in my mother's study, going over the first few acts of the kingdom before I venture into the party," he observes the man he's known from childhood. He knew a strange cast of people who claimed to be good friend's of his mothers. They all almost matched the stories his mother would tell, about a monk, a wizard and a pirate... but Reaver is no pirate, "My mother really regarded you highly, would you please join us?"

The man nods, "Skip the formalities boy, I've heard them _so_ many times. I will be right up there!"

Logan leaves the man and moves back to his duties. Reaver is now alone, except for a little boy chasing a dog, but he hardly notices. He stares back at Sparrow's tomb once more. Now he is with her children, and he will outlive them... and _their_ children. What a tiresome life this gets to be sometimes, perhaps Phillipa is truly correct when she believes they might one day meet each other still.

The little boy runs before Reaver once more, this time both man and dog chasing a wandering chicken. Or perhaps not, this life can get rather interesting at points.

_End_

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**Game Evidence/Historical Evidence:**

**Alright I chose the names Phillipa and Alexander because they were both 17th century names which I sorta figured would be Reaver's childhood era? Just took a shot there figuring 50 or 75 years before Reaver was born would have been the Hero of Oakvale's days... and that seemed very 16th century to me whereas Fable II with pirates and all that seems 18th cent. and obviously Fable III is 19th cent. Just some of my logic there, haha.**

**Also the Fable Wiki says in Fable II Reaver had blue eyes, but since I was dealing with Logan and Fable III I decided to go with his brown eyes.**

**I wasn't sure if he could use Culis Gates or not, and also found it really weird that Fable II's map looks nothing like Fable III's...**

**Overall:**

**If you have time please take a moment to drop a review, I love getting feedback on my work. This is my first Reaver fic and also my first Video Game category ever. I'd love to do a Niko Bellic story someday. My top favorite games are Fable, Saboteur, GTA, Saints Row, Sims, Silent Hill, and a few more. :) PM me if you ever want to chat Fable (could do that my whole day!). I would like to do more, but currently have no story ideas.**

**By the way, am I the only one upset you can not marry this AMAZING man in Fable. I always flirted with him in Fable II and he thought it was, "cute"... It's not CUTE REAVER IT'S SEXY! ;)**

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**THANKS FOR READING!**


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